Newspoll: 57-43

Lateline has reported that tomorrow’s Newspoll will show Labor leading 57-43 on two-party preferred. However, the big news from the survey comes from the preferred prime minister ratings: Rudd 70 per cent, Nelson 9 per cent.

UPDATE: The Australian’s graphic here. Note the question on the stolen generations apology, which puts overall support at 64 per cent. It would be interesting to see a state-by-state breakdown, because Westpoll’s survey of WA voters (published in The West Australian on February 11) showed 44 per cent in favour against 46 per cent opposed. Elsewhere in The Australian, that shameless Labor booster Dennis Shanahan reports that Kevin Rudd’s preferred prime minister rating has “overtaken the previous highs of Mr Hawke, on 60 per cent, and Mr Howard, on 67 per cent” – but with respect to Hawke, it must be remembered that the peak of his popularity was in 1983 and 1984, and that Newspoll did not commence operations until 1985.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

627 comments on “Newspoll: 57-43”

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  2. Hours of bloging by you lot on Peter Costello and not a SINGLE word of his
    11 years of achievements….not even one. Shame

    You have completely reduced Peter Costello’s career to whether he had the arrogance (waiting for the numbers to come) or whether he had the ticker

    and that sums up what political history will only record

  3. Zoom I really don’t think it would matter who was Treasurer, the same tactics would be used against them. Your response is the one Swan will use for sure.

  4. “The conservative cheer squad” will just have to deal with the tyranny of an enlightened majority in favour of things they don’t like.

    Won’t shut them up, of course. But, it will be nice to see them frothing and fuming furiously as they come to realise their mendacious influence on the decision makers has waned. Lost their dreams and now they lose their minds.

  5. I find also that there are strong similarities in the style of language used by GP and ESJ. And they seem to work in tandem. Three Faces of Eve? Sybil?

  7. Howard giving a speech pretending he can govern a country
    http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/howard-talks-the-talk-in-career-speech-therapy/2008/02/18/1203190740184.html

    [‘Mr Howard, who signed up only last month with the Washington Speakers Bureau, an agency for many of the world’s most prominent speakers, stuck to a less contentious script, saying that if Nigeria embraced economic reform there was nothing it could not achieve, considering its enormous natural resources.’]

    [‘According to a report on THISDAY Online, Mr Howard also called for more investment on infrastructural development, which he said was essential to building a modern nation’]

    What exactly did you do for economic reform and infrastructure in Australia JWH?

  8. Steve , the one clear point Peter did make last night was his distancing from responsibility for publication of the Maclachlan note.

    Peter acknowledges Ian spoke to him in the 48 hours prior to publication but Peter wants us to believe he is above that sort of skullduggery

    Keating in 1996 summed up the duo early on:
    Costello….’no ticker’
    Howard ….’a ticker without cloth’ (substance)

  10. Rudd’s had an awfully long honeymoon hasn’t he – ever since he was elected leader of the Federal ALP Parliamentary Party!! It doesn’t bode well for the Coalition that he’s doing best he can to honour election promises, and remove cynicism from Australian politics.

  12. KR141. You have more compassion than I for Hockey in his former carnation as minister for WC’s. To be the stand up man for that crap means you deserve all the bitch slapping that comes with that lofty position. To top it off his a lawyer too so my sweet mercy’s are less forth coming.

    Maybe I had a dream but the voters of North Sydney had decided to keep him. Yes but what a likable GRUB.

  14. Aussieguru01
    To top it off he’s a lawyer too so my sweet mercy’s are less forth coming

    a recent “Morgan” Poll of the 4 least liked were:
    4th Lawyers
    3rd Journo’s
    2nd Pollies
    ist Blogers banned to the Blogosphere solitary confinement ‘moderation’ zone

    as a regular occupant of the last option , it is nice to be loved

  15. I think some are a little harsh on Costello, for he himself made a valid point that many MP’s only knew Howard as leader.

    I reckon had Costello replaced Howard early 2006 he may well have won the 2007 Election, remembering before PM Rudd became leader many ALP supports felt he had no chance of winning an Election, I recall many mocked him as a nerd and a geek.

  16. Ron . To my potential embarrassment I was not aware of being banned from this blogosphere as yet & if so I ask for William Bowe for moderation instruction if necessary. Like any one I could have missed it or may be cautioned. Over to you William.

  17. #158: “Peter acknowledges Ian spoke to him in the 48 hours prior to publication but Peter wants us to believe he is above that sort of skullduggery”

    Sure, Costello would have liked to be PM, not because he had a burning passion to do something useful for the country but because the position was there and it would have been another step up from where he was.

    But some time ago, probably early in the 2000s, I reckon that Costello’s desire to be PM took a backseat to his desire for revenge on Howard. Costello felt cheated and used by Howard – it was written all over his face in the 4 corners programme last night – so his MAIN objective was not so much to gain the PMship himself but to destabilise Howard.

    So, through McLachlan, he made the public aware of the fact that Howard dishonoured their agreement. He began speaking to journalists about Howard’s ineffectiveness as PM – remember the Brisseldon revelations around the middle of last year? And he probably even had a hand somewhere in the leaking of the Crosby/Textor polling that showed that Howard was viewed as mean, tricky, and a liar by the public.

    Costello had no intention of fighting for the PMship because he didn’t want it nearly as much as he wanted to make Howard’s life just that much harder.

    Then, the most degrading thing of all for Costello, another example of how Howard used him to try to get re-elected as PM once more, was the day when he and Howard were interviewed on Today Tonight, where Costello was forced to convince everyone that he was best buddies with Howard.

    So, the final act of revenge came after the election when he refused the leadership just at the time that it was about to be handed to him. The message sent to Howard was, “See I didn’t really give that much of a rats about the leadership. I just wanted to make sure you couldn’t have it anymore, you lying b*****d.”

  18. Having a comment go in moderation is a completely different thing from being banned, which I only do on special occasions. Comments go into moderation if they include particular words, which are chosen to a) keep spam off the site, and b) reduce the chances of me being party to a breach of Section 7 or Section 8 of the Victorian Racial and Religious Tolerance Act 2001. The overwhelming majority of the comments caught up by this are innocent on both counts. They are usually cleared through soon enough.

  21. Thank you William. Ron. Now we are both aware of the protocols that are in place here I am absolved of any perceived breach. Ron if you like to be more direct in your reply to any of my postings I welcome it but I would respect you more if you don’t cast aspersions upon me like a school boy having a tease. We are grown ups here so pull your head in!

    PS – care to me us what is your political leaning? I bet you know where I stand 🙂 !!

  22. Mr.9% simply unelectable
    the man divorced twice, married thrice, piercing his ears (and nipples :)),
    stupid and liar (as he repeatedly self-confessed)…
    It would be a shame if Australia (ever) elect Mr.9% as prime minister.

    Don’t know why the Libs favour him over Turnbul? Let me guess: the Howard legacy/factor? Howard may be gone but his poisons certainly left in the Liberal party.

  23. I believe the song whose artist I do not know said it best, “The only way is up, baby; For you and me, baby; The only way is up; For you and me!” (1990’s) 🙂

    Nelson is the man! He will bring the Coalition closer to the middle ground. Turnbull should not go for leader until closer to the election in 2010 if the Liberal’s narrow the gap or 2013.

  24. Brendan “Fonzeralla” Nelson used to be a biker, leather jacket, white t-shirt ear ring the lot.

    May have been going for the Wild Ones image, but perhaps Mr 9% is really aiming for the two percenters target of the true rebel bikers image.

  26. Does any Liberal member actually know the rate of NAIRU, Peter Dutton though it was 5.1%, Steve Ciobo 4 – 4.5%, why ask this question if your own frontbench is confused. I think the biggest problem for Nelson is after Turnbull there isn’t much batting down the order. And Dutton thought he could be deputy-leader?

  28. #164
    “ist: Blogers banned to the Blogosphere solitary confinement ‘moderation’ zone

    as a regular occupant of the last option , it is nice to be loved.”

    The comment was actually referring to me as a regular occupant !
    following fun in check we blogers had the other night re the moderation zone
    and that Lawyers rated above us blogers placed in the ‘moderation’ zone.

    Aussieguru01 , if I’m going to criticise you I won’t hestitate to do so directly.
    On thi occasion you took offence at something that was not even directed at you and this was caused by MY lack of conciseness.
    ‘sorry’ unqualifed for your upset

  32. ViggoP (#170), I thought TWT reported that Brendan and Julie were rolled by shadow cabinet last night, though isn’t this something that would be put to the party room?

  35. “Here’s comes the Claytons backflip with lots of pikers.”

    So let me get this straight. Firstly, the opposition were opposed to the death of WorkChoices, then Nelson later announced that WorkChoices was dead. A few weeks later, he resurrected it. And now, WorkChoices has been declared dead a second time.

    Flip-flop. They have no idea what they are doing.

    But I guess the latest Newspoll was probably a clincher this time. Wouldn’t want to oppose Labor’s new workplace bills and risk a double dissolution when you are the most unpopular opposition leader in Newspoll’s history.

  36. Would Costello take on the leadership if Howard handed it to him in the “last minuite” on September 2007, when Howard called/anounced the election date?

    As someone put it, Howard crashed the car and then gave Costello the key! There was no point to hand-over at that late stage, but on 4Corners program, Costello sounded as if he would happy to take over two months out from the election.

  37. Ron. As you evaded a direct answer to my question to your political persuasion can I kindly ask to speak for yourself as to that matter, Be BRAVE.

  39. Julia gillard has just released 2006 stats re workchoices
    (you know the one “that never existed’ -hockey)
    absoulte dynamite-hope the MSM has the ‘mechanisms’ to publish this

  40. Keating said ” I’ll do you slowly ”

    The Coalitions tactics are clever politics , accept but amend
    which gives them a policy base to defend thats not 100% pro AWA’s

    Whereas the ALP I thought always were tacticly too loose in doing w/c in 2 waves…the second of which the Coalition will now be able to defend with
    “some” ‘political credibility

  41. Wayne Swan still under pressure, this time on the level of state debt:
    “Sometimes I’ll have the details on hand and sometimes I won’t.”

  42. ESJ – Harking back for a moment to your dummy spit the other day about who the ALP candidate was in Billy McMahon’s seat of Lowe in 1972, I was driven to explore that bit of political trivia.
    Have discovered it was Major Peter Young, who went on after his loss to be an independent consultant on defence matters and publish a defence journal, but was not President of the NSW Industrial Court as you thought. There is a Justice Peter Young who is Chief Judge of the Equity Division of the NSW Supreme Court, but that’s a different chap.
    You appear to have exploded erroneously.
    Major Young’s picture here:
    http://www.slv.vic.gov.au/hwtports/0/0/3/doc/hp003613.shtml

  43. That is a great disappointment re the AWAs, does this mean no longer referred to a committee/ senate inquiry

    Nelson and Bishop should hold firm, then we can have a few months of the inquiry, maybe even hearings, the report from the lib members of the inquiry and the report from the labor members.

    The libs need this inquiry to hear first hand for themselves about AWAs and Work Choices, seeing as how Hockey said that they were clueless that anyone was adversely affected.

  44. tanner got a nice quip in that will probably end up being the next election slogan

    “you cant trust the liberals with the public’s money”

    🙂

  46. Interesting Question Time today.
    Observations on ministers/others:
    – Swan is inconsistent at best – apart from anything else, he fails to realise that, when under pressure, it’s often best to be brief.
    – Tanner is good.
    – Gillard is very good and I suspect the Opposition will have to come up with a different way to deal with her.
    – Rudd gave one of the most boring answers ever – five minutes of my life I will never get back.
    – Mr Speaker is going to have his work cut out for him. But I thought he was ok today, except when he started giggling (yes I know some of the stuff is quite funny, but even so).
    – Turnbull is clearly the best of the Opposition.
    – No love lost between Julie and Julia!
    Overall, exactly as expected.

  48. Re: Swan, if Rudd is all about performing Ministers and getting rid of Duds how long can the Rooster stay in if he doesn’t even know the definition of NAIRU or know what the level of current State debt is! This is sad that your average blogger would know these facts and the Treasurer of the country doesn’t what a joke!

    This quote sums up how badly he has performed since becoming Treasurer on even basic economic questions…

    “Sometimes I’ll have the details on hand and sometimes I won’t.”

    What a shame the Tories folded on AWAs there was nothing wrong with pre-2005 AWAs but the stigma of post-2005 AWAs has unfortunately made them untenable what a shame 🙁

  49. Glen, IMO it’s not so bad that he doesn’t know the figure, but the way he expressed his limited knowledge of figures in general so starkly in a nice little grab for the TV news after several days of bad performances.

  50. Howard needed guys like Rick Astley in his corner ,
    but presumably not the dancer.

    j/v #192
    up to your post proving ESJ wrong for the first time , he’d had a perfect record,
    assume you posted your blog with great sadness

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